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Claims Alleging Job Bias Rise With Layoffs

As the sagging economy triggered massive layoffs, companies have grappled with a rising number of claims that they illegally fired workers on account of age, race, gender or medical condition.

For the six months that ended April 30, more than 70,000 people filed claims with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission saying they had suffered job discrimination, a 60% increase in bias claims compared with the same period a year earlier.

Federal law restricts employers from discriminating on the account of a worker's race, gender, or age, among other protected categories. Companies by law also are required to make accommodations for workers with disabilities.

Laid-off workers who can quickly find another job are more apt to move on with their lives and not want to be burdened with the hassle of filing a bias claim, lawyers said. "But employees are having a tougher time getting replacement jobs, and so they are likelier to sue," said Mark Cheskin, a Miami attorney who defends employers in discrimination cases.

But lawyers who represent employees say that when companies need to thin their ranks, they sometimes unfairly target certain workers, especially older and disabled employees.

"In a down economy, companies look to replace older workers with younger workers who they can hire at lower salaries," said Cliff Palefsky, a San Francisco plaintiffs' attorney.

The EEOC data don't specify the particular types of bias claims that have been asserted this year.

The EEOC this week filed an age-discrimination suit against Richmond, Va.-based Cavalier Telephone LLC, which provides telephone services in five states. The suit alleges that the company has sought out younger workers and refused to hire qualified workers who are 40 and older, according to the suit. Cavalier declined to comment.

Companies also are facing a rising tide of disability bias claims, attorneys said, due partly to the fact that Congress broadened federal law in 2008 to allow a wider swath of employees to claim that they are disabled. More than 21,000 people filed disability claims with the EEOC last year, a 10% increase over the previous year and a 20% increase since 2007.

"We now have a fairly easily met definition of a disability, whether it is due to a physical or mental condition," said Anthony Oncidi, a Los Angeles attorney who defends employers. "Employers are often at their wits' end about how best to accommodate an employee with an alleged disability."

Employers often try to defend against disability cases by claiming that it is too burdensome to accommodate disabled employees, said Michael Farrell, an EEOC attorney. "As companies become more and more strapped financially they will more and more raise that defense."

Mr. Farrell is the supervising attorney in an EEOC suit filed last week against Tarsadia Hotels, which does business as Comfort Suites. The agency claims that Tarsadia illegally fired a front-desk clerk in 2008 at a San Diego hotel because he is autistic. Tarsadia declined to comment. The EEOC's complaint says that the hotel claimed the clerk's job performance was unsatisfactory.

Several high-profile race and sex-discrimination suits have been filed in recent months, too. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. this month was sued by three female former employees who alleged that women bankers are systematically paid less and promoted less. Goldman denied the allegations.

The U.S. Census Bureau was sued earlier this year for allegedly discriminating against minorities by screening out job applicants with arrest records. The Census Bureau didn't respond to requests for comment.

More than 47,000 people filed discrimination claims with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in the first two quarters of its 2010 fiscal year— an 8% increase compared with the same period a year earlier. This article incorrectly said that in the six months ended April 30, more than 70,000 people had filed job-discrimination claims with the EEOC and that this marked a 60% increase in claims compared with the year-earlier period.